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If Congress doesn't pass comprehensive postal reform legislation soon, it could find itself forced to bail out the financially troubled U.S. Postal Service to the tune of billions of dollars, said Postmaster General Pat Donahoe. The postmaster general said in a speech at the National Press Club he's optimistic Congress will pass postal reform legislation this year.

Rep. Issa is waiting for the post office to run completely out of money to gain maximum leverage in the reform bill. At such a time, Mr. Donahoe and his Democrat buddies will either have to give in to most of Rep. Issa's demands or start laying off unprotected personnel. They may be wascally Wepublicans, but as Smokey Bear might say, they are smarter than the average bear.

Issa is just waiting for the right time so he can steal the postal trucks. As far as Smokey the bear, the GOP is dumber than the average bear. Hence because the saying is from Yogi Bear. GOP cowards are Anti Veteran, Anti American members of the Jane Fonda Club cowards. Any party that fields a canadate like the Draft Dodger Romney is pretty syupid to begin with.

We all know fixing the post office requires two things
1. Freeze the pension and eliminate lifetime healthcare
2. Close underperforming post offices and consolidate operations.
Then and only then consider bailouts or again jacking postage costs

"Freeze the pension?" The pensions are not the problem. "Eliminate lifetime healthcare?" That isn't the problem either. "Bailouts?" There is no need for bailouts. "Jacking postage costs?" Why not? Many of USPS' rates are capped at below cost and can only be raised in accordance with increases in CPI, despite the fact that there is no real relationship between USPS' costs and CPI. How in the world Congress ever believed that the price of a haircut and a new suit should be used to cap postage rates is beyond the ken of any rational person.

Increasing postage costs will only cause patrons to go elsewhere. Any business person knows that, but USPS probably doesn't. NOT operating as a business is what has got them into their present quagmire--that and a meddling congress.
Nothing to do with the USPS at this point but Thatcherize it.

Not all the different types of mail have high elasticity as you seem (mistakenly) to believe. USPS' prices are significantly lower than the other major carriers so raising USPS' prices on those competitive products is not likely to cost them a lot of volume. First-Class Mail is kind of a special case too. Since the factors that are driving the diversion of letters to other media are powerful and inexorable, price has little to do with it. So First-Class is pretty nearly inelastic - raising the rate from $.46 to, say, $.50 will have negligible effect on the volume and USPS will experience an increase in revenue.
Others ARE highly elastic, like advertising mail, because there are a lot of alternatives, and rate increases will cause the customers to look elsewhere as you point out.
Unfortunately, congress has tied postage rate increases to the increases in rent and sweet rolls rather than to sound business analysis and factors that actually affect the cost of delivery. The reality is much more complex than you or Congress realize. They really should let people who know what they are doing make the decisions that need to be made.

Just another fine example of a do-nothing REPUBLICIAN Congress that creates more problems than it solves. By the way Lacy that was YOGI and both BOO AND YOGI are much more intelligent than the average republican.

Ok it's all the Repubs fault. I guess it's still Bush's fault that unemployment is high, that our debt is now almost 17 trillion, That more and more people are on the Gov'ment take... How long you guys going to play that card anyway?

Two unfunded wars all the banks and hedgefunds going belly up check the dates and do the math = BUSH and the NEOCONS! Tell you what lets cut your pay and screw with your benefits oh but wait what if your one of the takers not saying you are but maybe.